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Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s Conservative party lost control of key councils in London, according to partial results from local and regional UK elections on Friday, with a potentially historic change looming in Northern Ireland.

The main UK opposition Labour party of Keir Starmer won in Tory “crown jewels” in the capital, including Margaret Thatcher’s “favourite” council Wandsworth, and Westminster for the first time since it was created in 1964.

Around two-thirds of votes for councils in England have been counted. Full results for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland are due on Friday evening and over the weekend.

The contest for the devolved assembly in Belfast could see a pro-Irish nationalist party win for the first time, with huge constitutional implications for the four-nation UK.

Predicted victors Sinn Fein — the former political wing of paramilitary group the IRA — are committed to a vote on reunification with the Irish republic to the south, a century after the island was partitioned.

The English results so far are not a landslide for Labour, which is seeking to capitalise on a cost-of-living crisis and Johnson’s own performance, including his unprecedented police fine for attending a lockdown-breaking party at Downing Street.

Johnson called the results “mixed” and said he took responsibility.

“We had a tough night in some parts of the country but on the other hand in other parts of the country you are still seeing Conservatives going forward,” Johnson told reporters in his constituency on the outskirts of London. 

But Starmer, visiting Barnet in northwest London, where Labour seized control of the council from the Tories, hailed what he called “a big turning point”.

“When it comes to London, you can hardly believe those names come off our lips. Wandsworth! They’ve been saying for years ‘You’ll never take Wandsworth from us.’ We’ve just done it! Westminster! It’s an astonishing result,” he told supporters.

– ‘Catastrophic’ –

The Conservatives are hoping to extend their 12 years in power for another term at the next general election, which is due by 2024.

Johnson, 57, won the last general election in 2019 by a landslide on a promise to take the UK out of the European Union, and reverse rampant regional inequality.

Despite making good on his Brexit pledge, the coronavirus pandemic largely stalled his domestic plans. 

But his position has been put in jeopardy because of anger at lockdown-breaking parties at his Downing Street office and the steeply rising cost of living.

Poor results could reignite questions about his leadership, putting his position in jeopardy.

Police on Friday said they were launching a formal probe into claims that Starmer had also breached Covid rules with a campaign gathering in 2021, slightly taking the heat off the Conservatives.

Labour is bidding to leapfrog the Conservatives into second place in Scotland, behind the pro-independence Scottish National Party (SNP), and remain the largest party in Wales, where 16- and 17-year-olds are eligible to vote for the first time. 

– Sinn Fein rise –

Numerous polls have predicted that Sinn Fein will be the biggest party in the contest for the 90 seats at the Northern Ireland Assembly, ahead of the pro-UK Democratic Unionists (DUP) and cross-community Alliance.

Sinn Fein leader Michelle O’Neill and her DUP and Alliance counterparts Jeffrey Donaldson and Naomi Long were all returned to their seats, with counting expected to stretch into late Friday or even resume on Saturday.

Early indications were that turnout was about 54 percent — down from nearly 65 percent in 2017.

Sinn Fein has dialled down its calls for Irish unity during campaigning, saying it is “not fixated” on a date for a sovereignty poll, instead focusing on the rising cost of living and other local issues.

O’Neill told reporters the election was “about the future”, promising a collaborative approach.

But she played down a threatened DUP boycott if she becomes first minister that would collapse the assembly and trigger potentially lengthy talks to revive power-sharing.

“I will turn up on day one,” she vowed.

The DUP withdrew its first minister Paul Givan in February in protest at post-Brexit trade arrangements that the party says threatens Northern Ireland’s wide place in the UK.

Donaldson, who wants London to rip up the so-called Northern Ireland Protocol, said it was still “too tight” to say who will take the symbolic first minister’s post.

But he again called for “decisive action”. “This has dragged on for far too long,” he added.

A UN convoy was to resume evacuations Friday of civilians still holed up inside a besieged Mariupol steelworks, the last pocket of Ukrainian resistance against Russian forces in the port city, but reports of renewed firing cast doubt on a promised truce.

About 200 civilians, including children, are estimated to still be trapped in the Soviet-era tunnels and bunkers beneath the sprawling Azovstal factory, along with a group of Ukrainian soldiers making their last stand.

Russia had earlier announced a daytime ceasefire at the plant for three days, starting Thursday.

But the Ukrainian army says Russian “assault operations” have continued by ground and by air.

Ukraine’s Azov battalion, leading the defence at Azovstal, accused Russian forces of firing during an attempt to evacuate people by car.

“During the ceasefire at the Azovstal plant, a car was hit by Russians who used an anti-tank guided weapon,” the battalion said on Telegram, saying the vehicle was “moving towards civilians to evacuate them” at the time. 

The strike killed one Ukrainian fighter and wounded six others, it said.

Ten weeks into a war that has killed thousands, destroyed cities and uprooted more than 13 million people, defeating the resistance at Azovstal and taking full control of strategically located Mariupol would be a major win for Moscow.

– May 9 fears –

It would also be a symbolic success as May 9 approaches, the day Russia celebrates the Soviet victory over the Nazis in World War II.

Ukrainian officials believe Moscow is planning a May 9 military parade in Mariupol, possibly with Ukrainian prisoners on display. 

The Kremlin Friday however denied plans for Victory Day celebrations in Mariupol, flattened by relentless Russian bombardment.

Moscow-backed separatists in southeastern Ukraine meanwhile said they had taken down traffic signs spelling out the name of Mariupol in Ukrainian and English, and replaced them with Russian ones.

Locals want to see proof that “Russia has come back here forever,” said Denis Pushilin, head of Ukraine’s breakaway region of Donetsk.

– ‘Hell’ –

The United Nations had said Thursday a convoy was en route to help civilians escape the “bleak hell” of Azovstal, where food and water are running out and medical care is minimal.

The convoy was expected to arrive sometime Friday, in what would be the third joint evacuation operation with the Red Cross in Mariupol.

Almost 500 civilians were already evacuated from Mariupol and Azovstal in the previous UN-organised rescue missions in recent days, said the head of Ukraine’s presidential office, Andriy Yermak.

He said renewed rescue efforts continued and that he would “give the results of this later”.

During last weekend’s rescues from Mariupol, civilians left in white buses, some taking three days to complete a 230-kilometre (140-mile) journey to Ukraine-controlled Zaporizhzhia, passing through multiple Russian checkpoints.

Azov battalion leader Andriy Biletsky wrote on Telegram Friday that the situation at the plant was critical.

“The shelling does not stop. Every minute of waiting is costing the lives of civilians, soldiers, and the wounded.”

Speaking to the Israeli prime minister Thursday, Russian President Vladimir Putin said his army was “ready” to provide safe passage to civilians at Azovstal. But he said the last Ukrainian defenders had to surrender.

– Staying ‘forever’ –

Since failing to take Kyiv early on in the war, which began with Moscow’s invasion on February 24, Russia has refocused its offensive on the south and east of Ukraine.

Taking full control of Mariupol would allow Moscow to create a land bridge between separatist, pro-Russian regions in the east and the Crimean peninsula, which it annexed in 2014.

Elsewhere, a Ukrainian official said Russian forces had almost encircled Severodonetsk, the easternmost city still held by Kyiv, and are trying to storm it.

Kherson in the south remains the only significant city Russia has managed to capture since the war began. 

A senior official from the Russian parliament visiting Kherson Friday said Russia would remain in southern Ukraine “forever”.

“There should be no doubt about this. There will be no return to the past,” Andrey Turchak said.

– Pentagon denial –

The United States is among Ukraine’s biggest backers, supplying military equipment and munitions worth billions of dollars as well as intelligence and training.

But the White House has sought to limit knowledge of the full extent of its assistance to avoid provoking Russia into a broader conflict beyond Ukraine.

The Pentagon on Friday denied reports that it helped Ukrainian forces sink the Russian warship Moskva in the Black Sea last month in a stunning setback for Moscow’s invasion.

Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said the US had “no prior knowledge” of the plan to strike the ship, which sank April 13, leaving a still-unclear number of Russian sailors dead or missing.

– Oil embargo row –

Ukraine’s government has estimated at least $600 billion will be needed to rebuild the country after the war.

Ukraine’s Western allies have supported Kyiv with financial and military assistance, and have slapped unprecedented sanctions on Russia.

In what would its toughest move yet, the European Commission has proposed that all 27 EU members gradually ban Russian oil imports.

But Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, whose country is hugely reliant on Russian oil, said the ban would cross a “red line” for Budapest.

On the diplomatic front, Berlin announced that leaders of the G7 group of industrialised nations would hold video talks with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky Sunday.

– Farmers on front line –

The war is expected to have a deep impact on food crops in Ukraine, a country known as Europe’s breadbasket.

Ukraine’s wheat production is likely to be down by at least a third from last year due to Russia’s invasion, according to data analysis firm Kayrros, using satellite imagery.

Some farmers are risking their lives to keep up with the spring planting season, finding themselves ploughing around unexploded ordnance.

“Every day since the start of the war we have been finding and destroying unexploded ammunition,” Dmytro Polishchuk, one of the deminers, told AFP before heading into a field in the southwestern village of Grygorivka to destroy an unexploded rocket.

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Israel conducted a large-scale manhunt on Friday for a pair of Palestinians suspected of killing three Israelis in an axe attack that came as the Jewish state marked its founding.

The attack on Thursday night in Elad, a central city mainly populated by ultra-Orthodox Jews, was the sixth in which Israelis have been targeted since March 22.

Witnesses said two assailants leapt from a car swinging axes at passers-by, leaving three dead and four wounded, before fleeing in the same vehicle.

The attack followed a tense period in which the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan, the Jewish festival of Passover and the Christian holiday of Easter overlapped.

The tensions have boiled over into violent clashes between Israelis and Palestinians at the Al-Aqsa mosque compound, a highly contested site in Jerusalem’s Israeli-annexed Old City.

Palestinians have been angered by an uptick in Jewish visits to the Al-Aqsa compound, where by long-standing convention Jews may visit but are not allowed to pray.

Israel has said the status quo would remain unchanged at the site known to Jews as the Temple Mount.

The United States and Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas condemned the attack. Abbas warned it could lead to spiralling violence.

But the Gaza Strip’s Islamist rulers Hamas and Islamic Jihad, another Palestinian armed group, praised the latest violence, calling it a consequence of unrest at Al-Aqsa. Neither claimed responsibility.

“This operation demonstrates our people’s anger at the occupation’s attacks on holy sites,” Hamas spokesman Hazem Qassem said of the Elad attack.

“The storming of the Al-Aqsa mosque cannot go unpunished.”

– ‘Pay the price’ –

Israeli security forces have mounted a massive search operation for the attackers, identified by the police as Assad Yussef al-Rifai, 19, and Subhi Imad Abu Shukair, 20.

As helicopters and drones roared overhead in search of the perpetrators, young ultra-Orthodox Jewish men in crisp white shirts were seen linking arms and chanting near the scene of the murders.

Women gathered on balconies overlooking the site, as masked forensic officers packed the bodies of the dead into bags and police stopped and searched cars.

A 31-year-old IT worker who gave his name as Yehuda told AFP he was afraid that “the killers have not yet been caught”.

“We suffer hatred and get murdered with an axe,” he said at the funeral of Oren Ben Yiftach, a 35-year-old from Lod who was among the three killed.

Police asked the public to provide information on the suspects after publishing their pictures and names. They were described as residents of the village of Rummanah near Jenin in the occupied West Bank.

The Israeli prime minister’s office identified the three dead as Yonatan Habakuk, 44, and Boaz Gol, 49, both from Elad, as well as Ben Yiftah.

“We will get our hands on the terrorists… and ensure they pay the price,” Prime Minister Naftali Bennett said.

The majority of Elad’s 50,000 residents are members of Israel’s ultra-Orthodox Jewish community, known as haredim.

Israel’s Defence Minister Benny Gantz announced a closure of the West Bank — in place for the anniversary — would remain in force through Sunday.

The Palestinian Red Crescent said 38 Palestinians were wounded Friday in clashes with Israeli forces near Nablus in the West Bank, including two teenagers who were shot with rubber-coated bullets. 

– Spate of attacks –

Prior to Thursday’s incident, a string of attacks since March 22 had killed 15 people, including an Arab-Israeli police officer and two Ukrainians, in separate attacks inside Israel.

Two of the deadly attacks were carried out in the Tel Aviv area by Palestinians.

A total of 27 Palestinians and three Israeli Arabs have died during the same period, among them perpetrators of attacks and those killed by Israeli security forces in West Bank operations.

Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid said “the joy of independence day had been interrupted in an instant”.

For Palestinians, the anniversary of Israel’s 1948 declaration of independence marks the Nakba, or “catastrophe”, when more than 700,000 fled or were expelled during the war surrounding Israel’s creation.

Last week, Hamas threatened Israel with rocket fire and attacks on synagogues if its security forces carry out further raids on the Al-Aqsa mosque compound.

“Whoever has a rifle must have it ready, and whoever does not have a rifle must prepare their knife or their axe,” said Yahya Sinwar, Hamas chief in the Israeli-blockaded Palestinian enclave.

The latest violence on Thursday at Al-Aqsa followed a tense April, in which nearly 300 people were injured in clashes between police and Palestinians at the site.

Ukraine’s wheat production is likely to be down by at least a third from last year due to the Russian invasion, a data analysis firm that uses satellite imagery said Friday.

Ukraine is a major producer and exporter of wheat, but the invasion has disrupted planting, which is still underway, both due a lack of fuel for equipment and farmers having to deal bombardments and unexploded ordnance.

French firm Kayrros said near-infrared and infrared imagery allows for determination of crop coverage and can accurately predict wheat production.

“Production this year is expected to be at least 35 percent lower than last year,” analysis of the latest data showed, Kayrros said. 

It forecast that at this stage Ukraine will be capable of producing 21 million tonnes of wheat this year, a drop of 12 million tonnes from 2021, and a 23 percent drop from the average harvest over the past five years. 

“Given that the fighting is ongoing and that a large part of the country’s wheat production comes from areas of eastern Ukraine where the conflict is most intense, the real production figures are likely to be lower than the current crop cover might suggest,” the firm added. 

Kayrros analysed images taken by the US space agency NASA between April 14 and 22, less than two months after the start of the conflict. 

Even if Ukrainian farmers manage to grow and harvest their wheat they face difficulties getting it to market given that Russia has destroyed transportation infrastructure and blockaded the port of Odessa from which most grain was exported. 

Before the war Ukraine accounted for about 12 percent of the world’s wheat exports, and the conflict has sent the prices of food commodities soaring.